Thursday, May 14, 2015

I stopped commenting at File 770 as it proved to be another exercise in demonstrating the truth of Aristotle's dictum about those who cannot be instructed. Give them dialectic and they shamelessly attempt to pick it apart, some honestly, most dishonestly, while constantly declaring that any errors or falsehoods on their part are irrelevant. Give them rhetoric to meet them at their level and they either cry about it or concoct pseudo-dialectic to explain why it's not valid.

Example 1
VD: SJWs always lie.
SJW: I told the truth once back in 2007. See, you're totally wrong. Your whole argument is disproved. You are a bad person. DISQUALIFIED!

Example 2
VD: I stopped commenting at File 770.
SJW: You said you stopped commenting and then LEFT ONE MORE COMMENT THERE! See, you're totally wrong. Your whole argument is disproved. Aristotle! You are a bad person. DISQUALIFIED!

Quod erat demonstrandum.

But the SJW theatre of the absurd aside, the continuing Hugo coverage at File 770 makes for interesting reading, particularly as the few remaining commenters possessing intellectual integrity one-by-one throw up their hands and stop trying to force the relevant facts through the SJW's cast-iron skulls. A pair of neutrals recounted typical experiences, as one of them juxstaposed his treatment at various Puppy sites versus SF-SJW Central:

Brief Side note re: Making Light. I posted there, maybe 4 times in a discussion a month or so ago. Never a name called, never a nasty word, did not attack anyone, and was in the middle of a dialogue with another poster that came across as reasonable. My posts were disemvowelled and the board owner called me a liar. I’ve posted several times here, and at Larry’s, Brad’s, and Sarah Hoyt’s boards. At least one time I got shouted at a little, but no one edited me away to nonsense. That makes me more sympathetic with the folks not grooming their comment sections /shrug

AG on May 14, 2015 at 3:20 pm said: Regarding disemvowelling at Making Light, I took part in the initial discussion about voting rules, which as a mathematician I found very interesting. There was a contributor there (I don’t remember his name) who was an expert on voting systems and made the most valuable contributions. I certainly learned a lot from his posts. Then he made a post where he mentioned his web site (which was on topic, because it was about voting systems and potentially of interest to the people who were taking part in that discussion) and he was disemvowelled, which is something that I had never seen before and found absolutely bizarre.

Ostensibly the reason was for spamming, although as I said the poster was the one who had made the most valuable contributions to the discussion and the link was not off-topic. Talking about it, he got several more posts disemvowelled. I respect owners’ right to moderate content in their sites, but I found the practice of disemvoweling abusive and humiliating, more indicative of a petty bully in charge showing her power than of a serious moderator, and it convinced me that I did not want to have anything to do with that site.

The Making Light crew is what it is, and what it has been for the past decade. Another former neutral expressed some degree of surprise at the insistence that the Puppy tactics have been in any way worse than past tactics utilized in the SF field:

Steve Moss on May 14, 2015 at 3:20 pm said:

David W. @ 3:08 pm- So log-rolling is acceptable, with all that implies, but slates are not?

Accepting for argument’s sake the definitions of some, a slate is a list of public recommendation with a common political interest. That’s bad.

Log-rolling, quietly horse-trading votes based on self-interest (I want to win and need to be “strategic”), that’s okay.

Leaving aside the debated to death argument on slates (which I disagree is bad), it occurs to me the greatest sin the SP/RP have committed is exposing the Hugo process to the light of day. Now that more fans know: 1) that it didn’t/doesn’t take much to get a nomination; and, 2) about the behind the scenes chicanery, the Hugo loses some of its luster.

I think the position of some in fandom is laughable. What SP/RP did is the exact same thing; they just did it better and publicly. And that’s unforgivable.

It's not surprising that the SJWs are already working very hard to change the rules because we've shown up and operated in an above-board manner. Instead of playing coy and disingenuous and plausibly deniable, we simply said "hey, vote for these works." Note that it wasn't all that long ago that SJWs in SFWA changed the Nebula rules to HIDE the evidence of all the log-rolling that was taking place there. They are always determined to hide what is actually taking place under the rocks where they dwell, which is why our straightforward tactics are so abhorrent to them.

UPDATE: While this will no doubt set the rhetoricals spinning again, it was too painful to watch people opining ineptly about whether Scalzi's LOCK IN was a relative failure (truth) or a massive success that only proves that John Scalzi is a massive success in everything he does (SJW narrative). So, against my better judgment, I pointed out the completely obvious that had somehow managed to elude the rocket scientists commenting at File 770:

Forget Old Man’s War and all the
hardcover vs softcover vs audio and so forth. The reason both Scalzi and
PNH were so disappointed by Lock In’s sales is obvious:

“Lock In’s sales are for the first 8 months”: 10,000

Redshirts first seven months: 26,604

As every writer here knows, success is a) relative and b) takes
trajectory into account. Doing one-third the numbers with considerably
more marketing expense than your previous book is not, in most quarters,
considered a desirable trajectory.

Scalzi is an inflated midlist writer. He has likely peaked at a point
much higher than most SF writers ever reach. It’s an incredible
accomplishment, especially if one takes into account how little talent
or originality he possesses. There is no shame in that.

Where there is shame is claiming that you have 2 million pageviews
when you truly have only 305,000. Where there is shame is aggressively
campaigning for nine Hugo nominations, and then campaigning for more
because two more than Arthur C. Clarke is not enough.

That is an apples-to-apples comparison. Hardcover to hardcover. And if that simple recitation of relevant facts isn't sufficient to convince you, then obviously no information is sufficient to instruct you or change your mind.

The media is trying to blame republicans for making a gay marriage advocate crash a train going twice the speed limit.http://www.gaypatriot.net/2015/05/14/was-the-dude-who-wrecked-the-train-an-lgbt-activist/

I was deleted & banned from posting at a place I posted for a while when they made fun of hicks from Indiana not getting apple products for simply posting "Apple's CEO cries for a boy cot because people won't serve pizza at his wedding yet he gleefully conducts commerce with nations that execute gays." I realize it probably ruined the fun of the thread but is it too much to ask for consistency?

When pressed, they always seem to act that way. This is OT but relevant to this thread. Hat-tip to Glenn Greenwald. Another tyrant using newsspeak to avoid defining their terms. http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p02r8z20

I found the practice of disemvoweling abusive and humiliating, more indicative of a petty bully in charge showing her power than of a serious moderator...

Good Lord, man. The Beast That Rules Making Light isn't a serious anything. However, the practice is more than a little indicative of the nature of Teresa Nielsen Hayden. A...well I suppose we will have to call her a woman I guess...who relishes her ability to inflict pain and petty cruelty where ever she can.

A powerless hag, desperate for power.

I have had nasty run ins with women who have had the same tragically deformed hamster powering their mental wheels.

Interestingly one trait they all seem to have in common is that their character is invariably carved into their faces by time.

I swear I need a lobotomy......I should know better. SHOULD KNOW BETTER than to click on links.Thanks Cataline. I was eating dinner. I set the plate down. Maybe this could be a new diet plan for me - click on minion links while eating. Then stop eating. Try to contain gag reflex.

Cataline Sergius May 14, 2015 8:36 PMInterestingly one trait they all seem to have in common is that their character is invariably carved into their faces by time.

"A mind full of lies contorts the body into misshapen ugliness. An ugly visage will infect the mind with ego-assuaging lies. Lies must be exposed at birth, or they will grow monstrous and consume everything beautiful in their path. In the wake of lies, ugliness follows like a toxic spindrift." - Heartiste

Funny, I was just googling PNH to see what kind of man taps a frogemoth like that...and no lie, on the google images page, scrolling down past a cascade of images of PNH and his consort..I saw an image of the cover of the Altar of Hate... Heh heh heh, all their base are belong to us.

SJW morale is just shot over at 770. Mike is too keen on letting it play out to be of much encouragement to the weeping SJWs. He clearly pulls for their basic objectives, but refuses to ban the marketplace of ideas...and they obviously don't have any.

“new title at #1 in two categories at Amazon.You really don’t understand how meaningless that is, do you?”

Yea its not like sales can be used as a metric since no one seems willing to buy up lots of double plus victim points titles such as. “If You Were a Dinosaur…” opps I mean

“If you where a gay marriage advocate who was cruising GRINDR instead of cutting the speed of a train in half my love. The Hugo award winning story of a liberal train wreck of an ex boyfriend.”http://www.gaypatriot.net/2015/05/14/was-the-dude-who-wrecked-the-train-an-lgbt-activist/

The reason they will never disambiguate if the Hugos are:A) The best of the best in SciFi, voted in mass by fandom.or B)An inner-circle recognition at ComicCon.

Is that they wanted to claim A) while doing B), the marketing and sales it drives is not negligible. So they are desperate to keep the status-quo, unfortunately for them the “mass” part of A) actually showed up and voted based on merit via recommendations by non-clique popular authors, regardless of publishing house.

Imagine if your favorite band recommended an under-rated band that they found inspiring and composed of excellent musicians, what the current Hugo inner circle want is to silence and minimize exposure to authors not sanctioned by them, and to maximize their profits in a market that keeps shrinking as a reaction to the crap (observable, measureable, concussive) that they have been pushing as SciFi.

Shame on them, a revolution was due and it took the form of Sad/Rabid Puppies.

As of today I have a renewed hope that my children will bring me SciFi literature that will get past my “how-did-this-get-published” filter, there are awesome authors out there. They should be part of the mainstream based on the quality of their work, not excluded due to their political values, being white, male or heterosexual.

I think the proposed rule change is to make a point of the SJW grievance against all five slots being taken by puppy nominations in many areas- if so, it might quietly slid off the radar before a vote.

The rule change they might really need is the one that makes future No Awards illegal, to prevent VD from retaliating against this year's SJW No Awards. Making Light might be holding off on this till after Hugo voting.

It strikes me as bizarre that they cannot understand why Lock In is a hard sell compared to Red Shirts. If you conducted a study to produce a humorous romp intended to appeal most to inner fandom, it would produce Red Shirts. Lock In, regardless of whether it is well written or any other qualities, is a nightmare scenario that is going to inherently filter out a certain portion of the audience. I can think of a number of people I've known over the years who would look at the synopsis on the back cover and immediately put Lock In back on the shelf, knowing it would be the source of nightmares for them. It's all the more chilling because it really happens to people in real life.

Lock In may be good, it may be bad. In either case, a lot of people just aren't going to find out for themselves due to the horror being too difficult for them to wall off from day to day reality. Any author has to realize that some books aren't going to be crowd pleasers but may need to be done so the next crowd pleaser can be written after getting the nasty finished and out of the way. I've known at least one writer who used pseudonyms just to avoid confusing his very separate audiences. (Then there was the NYT bestseller list dominator who produced a series of very dark novels under a different name and used the revenues to maintain his mistress in a Manhattan apartment.)

It’s an incredible accomplishment, especially if one takes into account how little talent or originality he possesses. There is no shame in that.

Or this . . .

Where there is shame is claiming that you have 2 million pageviews when you truly have only 305,000. Where there is shame is aggressively campaigning for nine Hugo nominations, and then campaigning for more because two more than Arthur C. Clarke is not enough.

I just couldn't believe that a) they coughed up the declining numbers of scalzi as evidence that he was on an upward trajectory and b) couldn't do less than/greater than as adults. I thought the enormous sales discrepancies between OMW and Lock-In would be acknowledged for odd "reasons" not freaking denied. Theater of the Absurd indeed.

No doubt, Cail. I thought that they were merely lying about the observable math. Turns out they are lying AND really that innumerate. They couldn't even cherry pick numbers that undercut their narrative.

* The current board members, along w/ at least 25 and no more than 100 other SFWA members selected by the board, decide which works receive Hugo nominations for the current year. A nomination is accepted is at least 2/3 of the board + selected SFWA members approve it.

* Hugos are awarded based on a general plebiscite using the current instant runoff voting.

* Nominations for new board members must be approved by a simple majority of the existing board members.

* Newly elected board members must be confirmed by a super majority (2/3) of the sitting board members, including votes from board members who are losing their seat. Any electee who fails nomination does not receive a seat and cannot run for the board for the next 5 years.

I was confused about disemvowelling, as I was still able to read it. Not as fast as English but at the speed of my 3rd language. Perhaps this is being done to keep stupid people from being bothered by complicated concepts while still allowing smart people to discuss them? I have a shirt that says "WHITE PRIVILEGE IS EVOLUTION that's why Asians have it also" which I wore out to amusement parks last year, and no blacks got offended by it because of their functional literacy rate. What do you think the minimum IQ or verbal SAT score would be to read disemvowelled writings? Perhaps add a couple of é, Ú, ü so that the cut/paste disemvowelling doesn't work?

"No doubt, Cail. I thought that they were merely lying about the observable math. Turns out they are lying AND really that innumerate. They couldn't even cherry pick numbers that undercut their narrative."

It doesn't matter if they can not figure out the actual numbers of votes as long as they know ahead of time who is supposed to win.

I don't doubt that it could be done, but I wouldn't put any money on this crowd of dimwit SJWs being able to pull it off.

I mean, they trotted out GRRM, one of their brightest lights, to take us down a notch with his superior erudition. He got destroyed within a matter of hours, both dialectically and rhetorically, and soon retreated into babbling and arguing with himself. That's their first string?

Every move they make just further exposes how weak they truly are. Maybe if they all get together and count on their toes, they'll figure out a way to manipulate the votes so they can give each other Hugos again. But that would only further prove the Puppies' point and spread the knowledge that the award on your book means nothing, so that's not a win for them either.

"What do you think the minimum IQ or verbal SAT score would be to read disemvowelled writings"?

An IQ of 80-90, especially 90, should be sufficient. It might take them a longer period of time, but they could still do it. Most people simply don't bother reading disemvowelled writing. I don't believe they're incapable of doing it. It is just more effort than they care to put in to read some random person's comment.

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